LAFD fines Palisades fire survivors for not clearing brush from their burned-down lots

Fire survivors get fined for empty lots

More than a year after the Palisades Fire destroyed their homes, some residents got a bill they never expected.

The Los Angeles Fire Department sent $31 brush clearance notices to people whose properties are now empty dirt lots. The notices warned that anyone who missed the March deadline would face extra penalties.

The LAFD brush clearance program covers about 141,000 parcels across the city’s high fire hazard zones.

Residents call the notices insulting

Carol Sanborn lost the home she lived in for more than 40 years.

When the notice arrived, she grabbed a red pen, wrote “insulting and cruel” on the invoice, and mailed it back. Her property has no house and no brush.

Christine Martinez, another resident who lost her home, called the notice “one final blow.” Martinez said she refuses to pay on principle.

Several neighbors got the same bills, and the frustration among fire survivors spread fast.

No one answered the phone

Homeowners who tried calling the number on the bill hit a dead end. The voicemail box was full, so no one could leave a message or reach a real person.

Martinez said she also tried writing to the department and never heard back.

Not being able to contest the fine, or even ask a question about it, made an already painful situation worse for residents still trying to piece their lives back together.

Mayor Bass called the fines unacceptable

Mayor Karen Bass said no resident who lost a home in the Palisades Fire should get this charge. Her office said it contacted the LAFD to figure out next steps.

A spokesperson for Councilwoman Traci Park called the notices “entirely tone-deaf to those who lost everything.”

Park’s office said it was working directly with LAFD leadership to fix the problem. But for residents, the damage to their trust was already done.

The city made this same mistake before

This is not the first time fire survivors got bogus brush fines.

In September 2025, a news investigation found the LAFD sent more than 300 brush clearance citations to Palisades properties that were partially or completely destroyed.

The department had been using outside inspectors from other agencies because of budget cuts and a bigger inspection workload. Those inspectors never got full training before heading out.

Bass called the September citations a mistake and said she would demand apology letters.

Promised apology letters never came

Residents say those apology letters Bass demanded after the September mix-up never showed up.

The LAFD said at the time it found only one email to a homeowner that cleared a citation but did not actually apologize. The department said it would not pursue those earlier notices.

But the fact that the same problem happened again just months later left residents feeling like the city was not paying attention to them at all.

The Palisades Fire leveled thousands of homes

The Palisades Fire started on Jan. 7, 2025, fueled by drought and Santa Ana winds gusting up to 80 mph.

It burned about 23,448 acres across Pacific Palisades, Topanga, and Malibu, killing 12 people and destroying 6,837 structures.

That made it the most destructive wildfire in Los Angeles history.

The broader January 2025 LA wildfires, including the Eaton Fire, killed 31 people and destroyed more than 16,000 structures combined.

Rebuilding has barely gotten started

As of January 2026, fewer than a dozen homes had been fully rebuilt across the fire zones. By early 2026, the city had issued about 2,600 residential rebuilding permits for an estimated 13,000 homes lost.

As of Feb. 21, 2026, Los Angeles had received 3,561 permit applications and issued 1,939 permits for 844 unique addresses.

Many homeowners cannot rebuild because they are uninsured, underinsured, or still waiting on insurance settlements.

Financial pressure keeps growing for survivors

Displaced residents are juggling insurance disputes, rising construction costs, and permitting delays all at once. Some homeowners have dipped into retirement savings to fund rebuilding.

More than 600 properties with destroyed homes have changed hands because the owners chose not to rebuild.

As alternative living expense coverage and mortgage relief begin to expire, many residents are running out of time and options.

One city department waived fees while another sent fines

On Feb. 3, 2026, the LA City Council voted unanimously to waive rebuilding permit fees for fire survivors. The waiver covers plan check and permit fees for structures up to 110% of the original footprint.

Councilwoman Park said waiving the fees removes one more financial barrier for people trying to get back home.

But the fact that one part of the city was dropping fees while another department was mailing new fines shows a real disconnect.

Residents feel the city is working against them

Sanborn said it is disappointing to feel like the city is working against residents instead of helping them. For many, the $31 is not the point.

It is what the fine represents after everything they have been through.

Residents are still navigating insurance claims, rebuilding plans, and permitting headaches more than a year after the fire.

The fines have become a symbol of what survivors see as repeated bureaucratic failures throughout their recovery.

Automated systems still have not been fixed

The LAFD brush clearance program inspects about 141,000 parcels, and its automated system still does not appear to exclude destroyed properties.

The LA County Fire Department’s separate defensible space program explicitly exempts homes destroyed in the 2025 fires from fees and inspections, but the city’s LAFD program never made that same update.

Budget cuts also cut three staff members from the brush inspections unit. Whether the city will formally void these latest notices and prevent future ones is still an open question.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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